Chechen human rights activist is accused by migration official of bribing refugees

Ivan Pomeshchkenko, an acting head of the Department for Migration Affairs of Ingushetia, accused Chechen human rights activist Ruslan Badalov of bribing several refugees. He announced it to the Prague Watchdog correspondent in Nazran on August 16.

Pomeshchkeno said, "Several women came to me saying Badalov had given them USD 7,000 yesterday in order that we campaigned against the repatriation of refugees to Chechnya. If you give us the same amount we?ll say exactly the opposite."

He is convinced the Chechen refugees have been so addled by these women that they now refuse to leave their tent camps. "In the Bella camp, there are six or seven troublemakers hell-bent on influencing the other refugees," he says.

According to him, there are some forces interested in hindering the repatriation process in order to politically profit from it.

Ruslan Badalov, a chairman of the Chechen National Rescue Committee, is shocked by the absurdity of this allegation. "For the past three years human rights activists have been accused of many things, but such a situation has happened for the first time," he insists.

Badalov rejects the accusations, describing them as an invention of "another Russian official looking to earn credit for this." "We just monitor violations of refugees' rights, collect their signed statements and visit the camps only at their invitation," he stated.

In his turn, he accused the migration officials of exerting psychological pressure on the refugees. According to him, they tell people to immediately leave the Bella camp and move to another place of residence. "It?s disgraceful that people who are duty-bound to assist refugees are harming them instead," says the human rights activist.